How to Support Employee-Led Mentoring Programmes One of the biggest barriers to widespread use of mentoring in organisations is HR time and focus. Lean HR teams in many companies have a wide range of urgent tasks and projects that tend to take priority over deep learning initiatives. Minimum effort solutions, involving matching platforms that put […]
Helping a Mentee Manage Uncertainty
When Uncertainty Becomes a Barrier Much as humans generally crave certainty, we have to live with constant uncertainty. It’s how we manage uncertainty that counts. In organisations, uncertain comes in two kinds: prediction uncertainty and decision uncertainty. Prediction Uncertainty Prediction uncertainty comes from operating in a VUCA environment, where we know that “best guesses” […]
Time to Man Up to Men Mentoring Women
When will the tide turn on the impact of #MeToo? We published our research “Cross-Gender Relations in a Post-#MeToo World” in 2018. It was our fervent hope that this would start a conversation about the unintended consequences of the #MeToo movement – namely that men were starting to avoid contact with women in the workplace, most notably, in […]
Mentoring People with Autism
Autism is a broadly misunderstood condition. While severe Autism may be disabling, it’s a mistake to think of all people on the Autism spectrum as disadvantaged. In reality, many autistic people have significant advantages over neurotypical people in general. They are better able to absorb and process large amounts of information, more focused and often […]
Mentoring and Menopause in the Workplace
Menopause in the Workplace: The Missing Life Stage in our Conversations. “I feel ripped off that no one talked to me about it.” [1] “I’m 46 and I felt so unprepared and shocked when it happened.” “The silence – it’s the worst thing, especially when you get to the top of organisations where the percentage […]
When a Mentee is Unhappy at Work
Unhappy at work? Everyone has times, when their job just doesn’t seem to give them the same satisfaction. These feelings of being unhappy at work don’t always last – simple shifts in role or responsibility can make a radical difference, for example – but when ennui sets in, the potential for disengagement and quitting rise. […]
Negotiating the Balance of Power Between the Team Leader and the Team
Power struggles in team performance One of the biggest impediments to team performance occurs when there is a mismatch between the leadership style and behaviours the team needs and those that the leader and the team default to. The word “default” is appropriate because there is usually an unconscious process of adaptation, which may be […]
Does the Advance of Technology Mean we are Forgetting how to be Human at Work?
How to be human at work… what the? A recent trip afforded me the rare luxury of time to read and catch up on recent TED Talks. It struck me that there was a consistent message underlying many of these – that as technology gradually infiltrates more and more of what we do, we are […]
Career Advice: What to do when the Mentee has No Clear Career Goals?
The “sweet spot” on career advice When it comes to career advice, it makes mentoring a lot easier, when the mentee knows exactly where they want to go in their career. The trouble is, many mentees – particularly those in the early stages of their careers – have only a general sense of direction (if […]
Fast Knowledge Transfer – FKT – is not Mentoring
Fast Knowledge Transfer – FKT – is not Mentoring In recent months, there has been a spate of articles and webinars extolling the virtues of “speed mentoring”, “flash mentoring” or similar means of fast knowledge transfer (FKT). We have also seen the rise of “Mentoring Lite” from major dot-com providers, providing rapid matching between people […]